Although the news released by the Hong Kong paparazzi had yet to be verified, and even if it was true, the wedding banquet was still months away, that did nothing to stop the internet from enthusiastically discussing and imagining what this marriage might be like.
Some posts speculated about the guest list:
[Will half the entertainment industry be there?]
[Could be. Ying Yin has been in the industry for thirteen years, after all.]
[But she doesn’t seem to have any particularly close girlfriends in the industry.]
[She does – Ke Yu. (Not.)]
[I suspect Ke Yu might be a groomsman…]
[Together with Shang Lu? (CP fans suddenly on high alert and getting excited)]
[The person above is killing me.]
[You Lu-Dao shippers really know how to smuggle your ship into everything.]
[You’re overthinking it. With the Shang family’s status, how could the wedding of the eldest son and heir involve inviting a whole bunch of celebrities? The guests will all be big shots. Are the celebrities supposed to go there just to take photos with them, add them on WeChat, and fight for the headlines?]
[Honestly, the main thing is that the Shang family is too low-key. It was already surprising enough that their son married an actress. From now on, they’ll probably be even more conscious about keeping their distance from the entertainment industry.]
Other posts were enthusiastically discussing the wedding traditions:
[Do big shots have those wedding games too? Like bridesmaids blocking the door and the groom having to “win” the bride?]
[Help, I’m already cringing and laughing at the same time.]
[Every single difficult little challenge can be solved with: “Ding! Your Alipay account has received 100,000.”]
[Given Shang Shao’s current public image, I really can’t imagine him turning the whole place upside down with his groomsmen trying to find a pair of high heels…]
But no matter what, the bride remained the most talked-about subject in every discussion.
Some people were concerned about Ying Yin’s wedding dress:
[Didn’t someone run into her in Paris before? She must have been there choosing her wedding dress, right?]
[Whoever manages to land her as a client is going to get an insane number of orders from all the rich ladies.]
[She didn’t attend the Starlight Diamond Awards or the Fashion Ceremony this year, and even her outfit on the Galaxy Awards red carpet was very simple. I’m so looking forward to seeing her bridal look.]
[Seriously, the more I think about it, the more dreamlike it feels… How does a story like this even happen? I couldn’t dream something like this up even if I tried.]
Others were concerned about what lay ahead for Ying Yin:
[Ying Yin isn’t going to retire after getting married, is she…?]
[Why would Ying Yin retire? I don’t think she will. Shang Lu is still making films, isn’t he? Keep it in the family – let her play another couple with Ke Yu! Go all out!]
[LMAO, one sentence and you’ve successfully made four people want to assassinate you.]
[Actually, it would be perfectly normal if she did retire. Since she chose this identity, she’ll inevitably have to take on the responsibilities that come with it. Managing such a huge family estate is no easier than running a company. Just handling all the social relationships would be troublesome enough.]
[Speaking of that, her mother-in-law, Wen Youyi, is really impressive. But Wen herself was born into a prominent family. Compared with her, Yinyin is making the leap from an ordinary background into high society, so her life will definitely be even harder than Wen’s.]
[As a fan, I’ve actually already prepared myself for the possibility that she’ll gradually step away from the spotlight. Sometimes I wonder whether wanting her to stay forever – making movies and walking red carpets – is just my own wishful thinking. Those flashing lights and cheers of the glamorous world seem so lofty and unattainable to us, but perhaps to the people inside it, they’re nothing more than a beautiful wall. Even if the wall is covered in painted flowers, those flowers only decorate the surface of its existence. A wall is still a wall.]
[I agree with the comment above. You only have to look at the lives of Hong Kong entertainers to know that most of them really enjoy – or perhaps even long for – a different kind of life after leaving the industry. Some go back to studying, some travel around the world, some learn to fly planes. Being a celebrity and acting are, at the end of the day, just an identity, just a job. Once your mindset changes, you can always go out and discover another version of yourself.]
[As a casual fan, I just hope she’s genuinely happy. Being the daughter-in-law of a wealthy family isn’t easy. I hope Shang Shao can help her plug up all eight hundred holes in her heart before the wind gets in.]
…
While the internet was in an uproar, a preview screening of When Snow Melts It Turns Green was quietly held in Hong Kong.
This was the first internal preview screening. Aside from the director and the core creative team, those attending included representatives from the production company, cinema chains, and distributors. Everyone present was required to sign a strict confidentiality agreement. Tiwen and Ying Yin’s Ning Ji Films was the film’s sole production company, so compared with the spectacle of other major productions – where scores or even hundreds of co-producers might be seated below the stage – the gathering could be considered remarkably sparse.
Tiwen was good at bringing people together. She had also already watched a rough cut at Li Shan’s studio and was confident in the film’s quality. So, breaking with convention, she invited a number of highly respected veterans from Hong Kong’s film industry. Naturally, this included members and directors of the Hong Kong Motion Picture Producers Association, the people who effectively held the power of life and death over whether a film would be submitted for the Oscars. These people each belonged to different factions of capital, their interests branching out like the veins of a leaf and extending towards opposite ends of the spectrum. Yet that, in turn, made things more convenient for Ning Ji, whose background was clean and whose position was neutral.
Besides, what kind of backing did Ning Ji have?
Its real shareholder was Zhuang Tiwen, the second daughter of the Zhuang family. Its sole artist asset was Ying Yin, the future young mistress of the Shang family.
Although the Shang family had never directly ventured into the entertainment industry, people would still show some respect for the family name.
The location of the preview screening was particularly unusual: the cinema aboard Shang Shao’s yacht.
There were only a handful of Chinese people who owned superyachts. Even in Hong Kong and Macau, where all kinds of wealthy tycoons – both respectable and less respectable – kept their fortunes carefully hidden, such a toy was still the height of luxury.
When the dozen or so invited guests boarded the yacht, they exchanged warm pleasantries as usual, but each of them had their own thoughts swirling beneath the surface. Some believed Shang Shao was laying his cards openly on the table, making it clear that he intended to back the film all the way. Others secretly wondered whether the implications of capital behind this arrangement weighed heavily upon them, forcing them to carefully weigh their options and consider exactly where they stood.
How could they have known that the real reason was simply that Tiwen did not trust a single screening room?
Stolen copies and damaged master tapes were nothing new, and there was no foolproof way to guard against people secretly recording a film. Tiwen had yet to find a distributor in Hong Kong whom she could trust completely. With the treacherous currents and hidden reefs of capital tangled together in every direction, she had no choice but to be cautious about everything.
As an important board member of the Film Producers Association, Liu Zong was also among those invited aboard to watch the film.
This time, he had not brought along his smooth and socially adept goddaughter, Yu Shasha, but another assistant instead. His mountain-like frame still moved with slow, square, measured steps, while the corners of his mouth habitually turned slightly downward beneath a sallow, bluish-grey face – the result of his poor liver.
Once he entered the brightly lit theatre and saw Ying Yin, however, those downward-curving lips lifted into a smile. It was an easy, familiar smile, carrying both the stature of a respected senior and the warmth and steadiness of an elder.
Not the slightest flicker of surprise appeared on Ying Yin’s face at the difference in his behavior before and after. She graciously invited him to take his seat and thanked him for taking the time out of his busy schedule to attend.
Only then did Liu Zong’s heart slowly and comfortably settle.
Exactly. When you entered someone else’s territory, you followed their rules. That was simply how things worked in every profession and every corner of society.
The greater the spectacle surrounding Shang Shao’s official announcement had been, the more uneasy Liu Zong had felt. Rumors of an internal screening for When Snow Melts It Turns Green had been circulating for some time, and he had spent his days at home unable to sit still, afraid that he would be shut out of the whole affair. When the invitation call finally came, followed by the formal invitation, the heavy knot in his chest collapsed all at once. He let out a long breath, almost overwhelmed by the mixture of relief and flattered apprehension.
Now that he was aboard the yacht and had been treated with courtesy every step of the way, Liu Zong began to feel comfortable again. Amid his satisfaction, he even thought to himself: At least these people know how to behave.
“Ah…” Liu Zong let out a sigh of admiration and said to a fellow board member beside him, “I could tell long ago that Miss Ying was no ordinary person. Exceptionally capable, bold and courageous, able to bear burdens that ordinary people cannot – so naturally, she can accomplish what ordinary people cannot.”
He phrased it beautifully, but only Ying Yin could hear the implication beneath his words.
She smiled faintly. “For you to praise me so highly today, I suppose my smile must have pleased you this time.”
Liu Zong froze, and his expression changed in an instant.
He remembered what he had said to her at the dinner table in Ningxia:
“You’re such a notorious social butterfly. You can smile sweetly at any man.”
His gaze immediately began to shift away.
He had never imagined that Ying Yin would actually dare to call him out on it so directly today.
Yet Ying Yin still wore that same radiant smile. Extending a hand to gesture the way forward, she said, “The film is about to begin. This way, please.”
…
When they boarded from the stern, the deck had been scorching under the low-latitude sun, giving them no sense of winter at all. But now, as the lights in the screening room went dark and the screen lit up, Aqiap’s vast world of ice and snow transported everyone into the depths of winter in an instant.
Ying Yin had given the more comfortable seats, with the better view, to the invited guests. She sat in the center of the front row with Tiwen. Fortunately, the yacht had been built for leisure, so even the front row was still a considerable distance from the screen – far enough that there was no need to strain one’s neck. From the perspective of the last row, she simply appeared to be sitting with perfect composure, her slender back held straight.
Bai Lan watched her for a moment before turning her attention back to the screen. The rest of the production’s key technical and creative staff sat around her. Screenwriter Shen Ling was seated to her right, with Li Shan sitting beyond her.
Jiang Te had been invited, but he had not come. It was said that the snow in Altay was particularly heavy this year, and the courier had no idea which winter camp Jiang Te had gone off to after circling the mountains, so the invitation could not be delivered into his hands.
They could still reach him by phone, though. The crackling of a campfire came through clearly over his thousand-yuan Chinese-made mobile phone. He was still a man of few words. After offering his congratulations, he asked Lishan to listen to the snort of a black horse.
It was the horse he had asked the crew to give him when he left. At that very moment, it stood tall amid the white wind and snow.
The final cut of When Snow Melts It Turns Green ran for ninety-six minutes. By today’s standards, when films routinely stretched to two hours or more, it was relatively short. This was thanks to the restraint that Shen Ling and Li Shan had agreed upon. Expansive shots of the empty snowfields appeared throughout the film, lending it a sense of having been stripped clean of all ornament.
Halfway through the screening, a narrow door at the back opened. A shaft of white light flickered through the gap as a man in a suit entered.
His Derby shoes made no sound against the carpet, and he disturbed no one. A waiter standing nearby with his hands folded in front of him had also been absorbed in the film, but the flash of daylight distracted him. When he saw who had entered, his lips moved, and a “Young Master” was just about to leave his mouth – but Shang Shao stopped him.
He made his way down the side aisle to the front row and took the seat beside Ying Yin. Crossing his long legs, he rested his well-kept hands casually on his black trousers.
Ying Yin tilted her face slightly towards him and whispered, “Why are you here?”
Shang Shao had been on the yacht the entire time. He had not originally intended to come out to watch the film or meet any of the guests, but he had finished dealing with his work earlier than expected. When he checked the time and realized that the film probably had not finished yet, he had suddenly felt like coming over to take a look.
Shang Shao made a quiet shushing sound. “I just happened to have some free time.”
The two of them did not speak again. To the outsiders seated in the back rows, he seemed no more than some guest who had gotten lost on the yacht and had therefore arrived late.
At this point, the film still had two kissing scenes and one intimate physical scene remaining. Shang Shao had been waiting outside while they were being filmed and had never known exactly what the shots would look like or how the interactions had been designed. Now, seeing them suddenly magnified across a screen hundreds of inches wide, something in him tightened. His breathing noticeably grew heavier and more difficult. After watching for a moment, he gave a self-deprecating smile.
It seemed he had overestimated himself.
He was still possessive. He still wanted to hide her away and keep her all to himself. The instinct of love was so powerful that it surpassed all the restraint and refinement his upbringing had taught him.
When Ying Yin’s hand brushed against the back of his, she found that although her own hands were already warm, his were even colder – almost icy in comparison. She paused in surprise and instinctively turned to look at him, but Shang Shao took her hand in his.
He did not look back at her. He merely held her fingertips tightly, his thumb resting on the face of her ring, gently stroking it again and again.
They remained like that until the very end, until both their palms and the spaces between their fingers had grown warm and damp.
When Yin Xueqing, dressed in a wedding gown, began walking up the mountain, Shang Shao’s break came to an end as well. He could not afford to be late. Although he wanted to stay and watch the final scene, he still rose to his feet with characteristic self-control.
He had arrived so quietly, and he left just as discreetly. As he climbed the steps, his backlit figure was outlined in a way that made him look slender and elegant.
Quite a few people glanced at him, each with the same suspicion in mind. But they could not see his face clearly, so it remained nothing more than a suspicion.
Then again, how could it possibly be him? they thought.
With his status, if his fiancée had taken on a film like this, who knew how many arguments they must have already had in private. How could he possibly come to the screening in person?
In the scene behind Shang Shao, Yin Xueqing, still dressed in her wedding gown, lay face-down on the snow. The camera rose, the sunlight falling across her eyelids. She closed her eyes and began humming a Kazakh folk song that Ha Ying had taught her.
It was not until the credits began rolling that the silence in the screening room finally loosened. Like a pine forest beneath a soft fall of snow, whispers rustled and hummed through the space, gradually swelling into a low murmur. Then, with Tiwen leading the way, applause broke out.
She had no particular instinct to be modest as a producer. If she thought something was good, she applauded without hesitation. The applause was far from sparse; before long, it swelled into a surging, thunderous ovation.
Everyone could see that this film represented Li Shan’s ultimate effort – a culmination of everything he had mastered. Traces of all his classic visual language could be found here. His choreography and composition within the frame had reached such a seamless level that the audience barely noticed the artistry behind it. And yet, paradoxically, it was all so restrained and simple, without any deliberate embellishment, carrying an almost cold, Zen-like quality.
But what ultimately remained in their eyes, what left its imprint on their hearts, was Yin Xueqing – the character brought fully to life by Ying Yin’s performance.
She was astonishingly precise, completely immersed and perfectly at ease within the role, to the point that it became impossible to distinguish the character from the actress, or the story from reality.
Judging from the synopsis, this might have sounded like a sentimental, tear-jerking romance. But as it turned out, compared with the tears brought forth by a tragic ending, what everyone wanted to do more than anything was breathe one long, relieved sigh.
And sure enough, everyone left the screening room almost in unison. They walked through the passageway and continued straight out into the three-o’clock afternoon sun. Only then did they begin to feel their spirits slowly warming back up.
Quite a few of those present were women in the film industry, and their experience of watching the film had clearly been far more difficult than the men’s. The gazes, scrutiny, and judgment directed at Yin Xueqing and her ex-wife, Nursia, had been so sharp and blatant, so utterly unvarnished, that they came at the audience head-on, leaving them suffocating, as though they had been forced beneath the surface of the water.
Yes – beneath the surface of the water was exactly what it felt like.
Because these gazes and judgments were so unobtrusive in everyday life. They were like a layer of crystal-clear water: women lived beneath it, unable to see it or touch it, only sensing that they could not get enough oxygen. And they might even come to believe that it had always been this way – that it had been this way for a thousand years.
“I really love this ending.” A female filmmaker deftly lit a cigarette and said to Li Shan, “Yin Xueqing doesn’t die in Ha Ying’s arms. The final beauty of her life and her love isn’t fulfilled by a man, nor does it need to be cleansed by a man’s tears. Ha Ying doesn’t appear at the end either. All we hear is their dialogue in voice-over: ‘You still haven’t told me how snow can be green.’ ‘When the snow melts, you see the grass. That’s where the green comes from.’ It’s wonderful.”
She said “wonderful” twice in succession. “Not seeing Ha Ying’s grief-stricken breakdown or hysteria is wonderful, and that dialogue is wonderful too.”
She was nearly seventy, only a year or two younger than Li Shan. Her name was Zhang Wei, though people in the industry called her Sister Wei. Zhang Wei had worked on a series of projects centered on women’s lives and perspectives. In the deeply conservative entertainment industry – and especially in the even more deeply conservative Hong Kong entertainment industry – she was practically a lone warrior.
“Bravo.” Zhang Wei opened the hand holding her cigarette and exclaimed again. Then she smiled and asked, “Director Li, I have to say, seeing a film like this made by you is a little hard for me to process. How did you and Shen Ling come up with a theme like this?” She blinked. “It’s very un-capitalist, very un-male of you.”
Both men felt as though she had taken a dig at them, and they laughed one after another.
Shen Ling modestly replied, “I’m an ordinary man. In the script, it was just an ordinary tragic love story. I really don’t deserve such high praise from you.”
Zhang Wei turned her gaze towards Li Shan.
“What you’re sensing now was originally just a few strokes of ink, not the hand of the principal artist,” Li Shan said. “In fact, at the very beginning, it really was just a romantic story about rescuing a woman from a life of degradation. But later, when I went to Los Angeles to visit my ex-wife and younger daughter, I had a very long conversation with them.”
Li Shan paused. Under Zhang Wei’s encouraging, expectant gaze, he continued, “And later still, the role of Yin Xueqing encountered the actress who was destined to play her. To be honest, I adjusted things every single day on set. The shooting schedule practically became meaningless on paper. Fortunately, my producer was an exceptionally understanding young lady.”
Zhang Wei smiled and nodded. “So, in that case, the creation of this film owes its success to the support of three – no, four – women behind the scenes.”
Li Shan could do nothing about her sharpness. “Those are things I was planning to save for the reporters’ interviews. And you’ve already coaxed them out of me.”
Zhang Wei folded her arms and looked at him with bright eyes. “But from the perspective of love alone, it’s undeniably moving as well. Love makes us pure. It makes us feel ashamed of the time we’ve wasted, the ways we’ve been frivolous, the times we failed to cherish what we had. It makes us loathe ourselves. That’s an emotion both men and women can experience. Yin Xueqing and Ha Ying are both honest. They don’t pretend; they face themselves head-on. That is the power of love. There is nothing shameful about sincere, wholehearted love. You captured that, and it feels as solid as the earth itself.”
Tiwen was accompanying Ying Yin as they chatted with several of the other senior figures about the film. When Zhang Wei came over, everyone knew she was a formidable character, and the veteran filmmakers all broke into smiles before she had even said a word.
“You should be getting ready to write your eight-thousand-word film review,” Yan Lilan said.
He was a celebrated intellectual and cultural figure in Hong Kong, with close ties to the film industry, and the most senior person among everyone present that day. But he was something of a free spirit. He served only as an honorary board member and held no real authority. The industry treated him as an honored guest, inviting him to say a few flattering words whenever they needed to add some prestige and polish to an occasion.
Zhang Wei bantered with him through a cloud of cigarette smoke, laughing without the slightest courtesy. “This film is probably only going to make sense to men at about fifty percent. You must have related to it more than anyone. After getting divorced so many times, is the only line you remembered the one that goes, ‘You put a lock on love and made it so heavy’?”
Yan Lilan was mild-mannered by nature and did not take offence at her jab. He laughed along and waved his hands. “I can’t win an argument with you. Just please don’t ever get Alzheimer’s, or I’ll find life terribly boring.”
Zhang Wei tapped the ash from her cigarette. After laughing, she turned towards Zhuang Tiwen and Ying Yin.
“Miss Zhuang, this is only the second time I’ve met you. And Ying Yin, I’ve admired you from afar for a long time. Knowing I was going to meet you today gave me a particular feeling – ‘the closer one gets to home, the more apprehensive one becomes.’”
She had long been familiar with Ying Yin through her various films and performances, almost as though they had known each other spiritually for years. Yet she had been afraid that, after meeting her in person, she might discover that beneath the gorgeous golden robe was nothing more than a scarecrow.
Ying Yin replied with a touch of humor, “Then I’d better say less today – and be very careful about what I say.”
After some more small talk, Tiwen went off to entertain several of the distributors. Zhang Wei stubbed her cigarette out against a beer can, lowered her head, and exhaled the last of the smoke before saying, “Making this film must have been incredibly difficult for you.”
The ecosystem on a film set was by no means fictional. And with the added weight of being immersed in the role, all those gazes, judgments, and unabashed acts of prying that the audience merely found suffocating were things Ying Yin had genuinely experienced herself. The more tender her soul and emotions were, the more real that pain became when laid bare before the audience.
“You lent us a piece of your life so that we could ‘borrow arrows with straw boats.’” Zhang Wei loved alluding to classical stories. Having said this, she punched one palm with her fist. “There we go. When you have the worldwide premiere, I’m going to write an exclusive interview with you, and I’ll use that as the headline.”
“After filming wrapped, quite a long time passed. The sense of conviction I’d had in front of the camera gradually faded with time. At night, I would often wake up suddenly and question myself,” Ying Yin said. “Was any of what I acted out actually useful, Ms. Zhang?”
“It hurts, but it has been seen,” Zhang Wei said firmly, looking directly into her eyes. “First, people have to see something before we can talk about anything else. When something remains unseen, there’s no way to begin discussing it or changing it. That is the meaning of cinema. It helps us drag the elephant in the room out into the open.”
Ying Yin paused, then smiled from the heart. “Thank you.”
After dinner, the yacht returned to port.
Quite a few of the guests had hoped they might get to meet Shang Shao in person. If things went well, perhaps he would be willing to add them on LINE out of consideration for his fiancée; at the very least, they could exchange business cards. But from beginning to end, the legendary heir apparent never appeared.
It was only when Yan Lilan asked about him that Ying Yin explained on his behalf, “His schedule is very busy, and he rarely interferes with my career. He didn’t come aboard today.”
Once all the guests had departed, she returned to the suite on the second-floor deck and found Shang Shao in the study.
Shang Shao held a cigarette between his fingers, a calligraphy brush in his other hand. A thick stack of xuan paper lay spread across the desk. He wrote one sheet, lifted it away, smoothed the next with a paperweight, and continued writing.
Ying Yin approached, carrying her fragrance with her. Shang Shao did not turn around, but he already knew she was there. His brush paused briefly above the paper. With an utterly serious, expressionless face, he wrote: Be vigilant even when alone.
Ying Yin wrapped both arms around his waist from behind and tilted her head to one side, quietly watching him finish the sheet before she finally said, “I missed you.”
Shang Shao set down his brush, turned around, and leaned casually against the desk as he gathered Ying Yin into his arms.
“How was the response to the screening?” He took off his silver-rimmed glasses.
“Very good. But they’re still not particularly optimistic about its box office prospects. It’s not really the kind of film made for the mainstream cinema market,” Ying Yin answered truthfully. Tilting her chin up, she looked at him with slightly tipsy eyes, bright and fluid in the reflection of the lamplight.
Shang Shao lowered his gaze and looked into her eyes for a moment before holding her by the waist and kissing her.
The night was quiet, and so was the harbor. The deep-blue canopy of the sky was reflected in the water, making the scene look like something out of a Van Gogh painting.
Ying Yin had not had to attend many social functions for a long time, and she had drunk quite a bit today. Nestled drowsily in his arms, she murmured, “If we can’t even make our money back, we’re doomed. I’ve got more than ten million of my own money invested in this.”
“I’ll make up the difference for you,” Shang Shao said, rubbing the acupressure point at the back of her neck.
“Once the preview screenings here are over, Lishan will submit it for review. So many of those shots didn’t even make it into the final cut.”
“How do you know?”
“I remember.”
Shang Shao gave an almost inaudible laugh. “You remember the scenes you filmed with other people that clearly?”
“What are you talking about? There weren’t even that many altogether…” Ying Yin argued quietly. Then, after thinking about it, she let it go. “I suppose that’s normal, though. The footage they shoot is often more than twice as much as what ends up in the final film, and Lishan is the kind of director who likes to cut things down.”
Shang Shao waited for her to show some concern for him.
But nestled in his arms, Ying Yin was already on the verge of falling asleep. Shang Shao waited for a while, only to feel her body gradually grow heavier against him. He smiled helplessly, let out a long breath, and carried her back to the bedroom in his arms.
Later, the household staff came in to tidy the study and picked up the crumpled balls of paper scattered across the floor. No one knew that, written again and again on those wrinkled sheets of xuan paper, were the words:
Lighting the lamps holds no interest; treading through the snow brings no joy.
The handwriting was messy and languid, clearly revealing how distracted he had been.
Ying Yin slept until the middle of the night before waking groggily. She reached out beside her but found no one there. Opening her eyes, she saw that she was alone in the bed.
Barefoot, she climbed out of bed and, still half-asleep, drifted into the guest bedroom next door. She climbed onto the bed on her knees, then burrowed straight into Shang Shao’s arms.
Ying Yin’s movements woke him. He lifted one arm to accommodate her, not knowing whether to laugh or cry.
“Why are you awake?”
“You weren’t sleeping with me,” Ying Yin accused.
“You hadn’t taken a shower.”
“You didn’t help me wash.”
“I was afraid of waking you.”
“You don’t like me.”
Shang Shao could only wrap his arms around her.
The warmth of her body and breath had brought out the faint scent of alcohol mingled with the fragrance of her hair, making her seem like a little Dionysian goddess, crowned with a garland of fresh fruit and flowers.
Ying Yin slept for a while longer, then suddenly gave a little start and woke up again. Lifting her chin and blinking sleepily, she asked in a muddled voice, “You watched the film today. What did you think?”
At last, Shang Shao had gotten the question he’d been waiting for.
He let out a soft sigh and said, with complete sincerity, “I’m happy for you.”
“Hmm?”
“Because your performance wasn’t wasted. That’s one of the great blessings in life.”
“You weren’t jealous? Or upset? Or feeling stifled?” Ying Yin pressed him for an answer.
“I’m human. Of course I get jealous, upset, and stifled,” Shang Shao replied calmly.
Ying Yin stared at him blankly, then said with genuine admiration, “You really can’t tell at all.”
Shang Shao: “…”
At that very moment, he really did feel a little stifled.
He pulled his arm free and turned over, moving on top of her. His eyes lowered as he gazed at her quietly for a moment, looking both helpless and resigned.
“Miss Ying,” he said, “you really make me feel very insecure.”
Ying Yin bit her lip. Cleverly, she guessed, “You mean I haven’t been caring enough about you.”
Shang Shao’s gaze had already darkened.
“That’s all right,” he said. “I’ll make sure to properly confirm whether you still like me as much as you used to.”
The way he intended to “confirm” it was clearly not going to be very proper.
Ying Yin panicked. “I haven’t washed – mmph…”
He caught her by the chin and kissed her.
Shang Shao kissed her for a while before carrying her into the bathroom. He helped her wash with meticulous care. His long fingers moved slowly – one could even say deliberately so – but the water from the showerhead was powerful.
Once she was clean, he loosely wrapped her in a bathrobe and carried her back out, taking her onto the uniquely secluded deck, hidden from view no matter the angle.
His patience was wearing thinner and thinner. During those few short steps, his brow remained drawn in barely concealed impatience, and by the time they reached the deck, he was almost unable to wait any longer.
The harbor was damp at night, and the white fabric sofas outside had absorbed the heavy evening dew. Ying Yin disliked sitting somewhere so cold and damp, so she sat in his lap instead, facing a pool of turquoise-blue water, with the night and the sea stretching beyond the end of the yacht.
The yacht designer’s ingenuity could block every line of sight, but it could not contain sound. Li Shan, Shen Ling, and Tiwen were all staying overnight on the yacht. Ying Yin did not dare make a sound and pressed a hand tightly over her lips.
But after only a few seconds, her hand lost its strength. Naturally, Shang Shao was unwilling to let anyone else hear her either. While kissing the curve of her ear, he slipped his fingers into her mouth.
After a while, they indeed heard Li Shan and Zhuang Tiwen – the pair of friends separated greatly in age – taking a walk and chatting somewhere on another part of the deck.
Ying Yin immediately stiffened and tried to run, but Shang Shao held her firmly in place. Lowering his head against her chest, he laughed soundlessly, his shoulders shaking.
He’d told them from the beginning that they shouldn’t have let anyone stay overnight. They were clearly on his own territory, yet he had somehow managed to end up feeling guilty about disturbing the peace.
Li Shan’s aged voice came slowly and unhurriedly. He said that now he was getting older, he would inevitably wake up around one in the morning. He had to write a few pieces of calligraphy or take a walk before he could go back to sleep until four or five.
Tiwen’s voice, on the other hand, was bright and crisp as she laughed. “And I just happen to have the habit of not going to sleep until after one.”
“Which goes to show,” Li Shan said, “that although old people and young people are separated by a time difference as wide as the one between China and America, it’s not as though we’re complete opposites, with one living in daylight and the other in darkness.”
Tiwen had recently been taking professional courses in film management and had accumulated quite a few thoughts and questions. The opportunity was perfect, so she leaned against the railing and discussed them with Li Shan while having a late-night snack.
They had made their way up to the third deck. Their conversation was remarkably clear, carried down by the night breeze.
Ying Yin was red from head to toe. Her half-open bathrobe had slipped from her shoulder, and her body began to tremble in small, uncontrollable shivers.
She refused to move, tears clinging to her lashes as she rubbed them against the hollow of Shang Shao’s neck, leaving it damp. Shang Shao was suffering just as badly, his brows drawn tightly together. He stroked the center of her back and her shoulder blades while murmuring hot breaths into her ear, coaxing her softly.
After a while, it became unbearable for both of them. He finally pulled away, picked her up, and carried her back into the room, then locked the balcony door behind them.
When he returned, it was almost as if he were taking revenge, deliberately making noise without restraint.
On the bow deck of the third level, Tiwen watched the shimmering lights scattered across the sea. Then, changing the subject, she said, “I heard that Cesare has already gone to Los Angeles.”
Cesare was Cannes’ newly appointed head of film selection.
The three major European film festivals were mutually exclusive in a sense, because they had strict rules regarding a film’s premiere. If a film wanted to compete at one of the festivals, then – with the exception of certain non-competitive screening sections – it generally had to make its world premiere there. As a result, competition among the Big Three for outstanding films was fierce, particularly between Venice and Cannes, whose festivals were held relatively close together.
As the foremost of the three, Cannes had in recent years been making a concerted effort to attract commercial films and major stars to France, in order to maintain its global profile. That was why Cesare travelled to Los Angeles every spring. His task was to select and invite films from the slates of Hollywood’s major production companies that met the required standard, whether in quality or prestige.
Lishan mentioned several Hollywood films that had attracted considerable attention the previous year. Tiwen listened quietly until he had finished, then asked directly, “Is there any chance he might fly to Hong Kong?”
Although Li Shan had extensive experience with all three major European festivals, it was precisely because of that experience that he could only laugh at Tiwen for being too naïve. It was certainly possible that they might invite him, but to expect them to make a special trip all that way for his sake was simply wishful thinking.
But a month later, Cesare really did come.
And arriving in Hong Kong almost at the same time as him was Venice’s head of film selection, Dafu.
